-
Android Doubles Down on Design
Khoi Vinh on Android’s recent efforts to not only embrace design, but engender a design culture where one doesn’t currently exist.
Visit -
Google URL Shortener API
The Google URL Shortner API looks really nice. Has everything you’d want (analytics, etc.), and seems super-simple to use.
Visit -
HTML5 Geolocation with Fallback to Google Ajax API: HTML5
This looks a bit more bulletproof than the fallback I’ve done on BarStar — might have to switch to this when I get a moment.
Visit -
Google Latitude
Google’s new Dodgeball replacement/Brightkite competitor. Looks okay, but I’m not convinced it’s ready to replace Dodgeball and Brightkites.
Visit -
The Skinny on Doctypes
I love this post of Dustin’s about how Google uses a shortened version of the
VisitDOCTYPEstring to save bytes, even though it makes a validator say their pages are invalid. I don’t personally get too worried about a few bytes, but that’s a Very Big Deal™ to Google, and this is a perfect example of what I mean by “use web standards and best practices when they make sense, and don’t when they don’t.” Here, they’ve found a better solution for them than the understood “best practice.” That’s awesome. -
Google Testing Blog: TotT: Mockin Ur Objectz
The Google Blog goes LOLCAT. It’s informative, and funny, too.
Visit -
Django googlesearch
Uses the Google search API to add a simple site search to your Django project. Looks interesting. Might consider adding this to Savoy as a lightweight alternative to the more heavy-handed djangosearch.
Visit -
Report: Google talks $200,000,000 acquisition of Digg
If this is accurate, I can only say a big congrats to all my awesome friends at Digg. You guys totally deserve it. Woohoo!
Visit -
Google Maps’ Street View now available in 37 more cities…
…and Seattle, the 12th biggest metro in the USA and the area that houses America’s second-largest population of Google employees, still isn’t one of them. WTF?!
Visit -
Using memcache with Google App Engine
You can now use memcached with Google’s App Engine. Sweet.
Visit -
Google AJAX Libraries API
Google is now serving copies of popular Javascript libraries, including Prototype, Mootools, jQuery, and Dojo, to help with caching. Nice.
Visit -
Dave Shea: Image Replacement + Google
> So it appears that, short of a set of stone tablets carried down from the hills of Mountain View, we do have a fairly clear answer. Using CSS image replacement in a responsible way, where the image truthfully represents the content it’s replacing, is safe to use. The simple act of hiding text from users is not enough to get your site banned from Google’s index.
I think most of us have always suspected non-shady use of image replacement would be fine by Google, but now we (mostly) know for sure. Thanks, Dave!
Visit -
Google diving into 3D mapping of oceans
Two words: Hell. Yes.
Visit -
Developing with Google App Engine, Part I
Adam Howell at Vitamin posts part one of a good-looking tutorial on developing in Python with Google App Engine.
Visit -
Google: Crawling through HTML forms
> “Specifically, when we encounter a FORM element on a high-quality site, we might choose to do a small number of queries using the form.”
I generally trust Google to do the right thing, but this sounds a little sketchy. I’m sure I don’t fully understand it, though, so we’ll see. I hope they’re only doing this on GETs, and not POSTs.
Visit -
Google App Engine
Google announces App Engine, a wonderful-looking set of tools and APIs that lets you run your web applications on Google’s infrastructure. Nice. What’s more? It’s entirely written in Python, and Python is also the first supported language for App Engine apps (more are coming down the road). What’s even more? App Engine includes Django. That is to say, Google wants you to use Django to write your applications, just like they use it to write many of theirs. If that’s not a good endorsement, I don’t know what is.
Visit -
Google I/O Web Forward conference
Good-sounding event for the development crowd (moreso than the design crowd). Features talks on JavaScript/AJAX, geo, APIs, mobile, and more from big names at Google including Guido Van Rossum and David Glazer. San Francisco, late May.
Visit -
Google Static Maps API
Similar to their charts API, Google offers up a static maps interface, whereby map images are served up directly via nothing more than a URL and some parameters. Neat.
Visit -
Google Charts template tags for Django
Jacob Kaplan-Moss has put together pretty much the coolest thing I’ve seen in a long time. Can’t wait to play with this. Be sure to check out the example page. Sooo nice.
Visit -
Google Android UI Gallery
Google’s Andriod mobile phone UI is heavily inspired by the iPhone, but not so much so that I’d call it a rip off. It’s not as sexy as the iPhone’s UI, but it looks every bit as usable. Bottom line: the iPhone trounces it in the style department, but Andriod still looks better than 99% of mobile phone UIs. Bring it on, Google.
Visit -
Google Maps Street View: 645 New Hampshire, Lawrence, KS
Lawrence, KS — my old stomping grounds — gets Google Maps’ street view before Seattle. This is an outrage.
Visit -
Google Blog: Seattle Conference on Scalability 2008
This conference just so happens to be in Seattle, on my birthday. So, if any of you geeks are interested in scalability, come up to the S-E-A and we’ll party.
Visit -
Matt Croydon: Why I’m not worried about Google News Local
A picture is worth a thousand words.
Visit -
Blogger now an OpenID provider
First Yahoo!, now Google. I’d say OpenID is fo’ real.
Visit -
An inside look at Google Seattle
I was invited to the open house for Google’s new office here in Fremont (a couple blocks from Blue Flavor, actually), and I can say, with a great deal of confidence, that’s it’s the most incredible workspace I’ve ever seen. The only reason I probably wouldn’t take a job there: I don’t think I’ve ever bring myself to leave the office at night. From the article:
> It’s amazing that Google employees can get any work done. Between the three daily catered meals, on-site massage therapist, free gym membership and game room (complete with air hockey, darts and Foosball), Google’s new development center in Fremont boasts amenities that rival some resorts. Just in case there aren’t enough entertainment options, kayaks are available so staffers can go for a mid-day paddle on the nearby Lake Washington Ship Canal. There’s even a “quiet room” — complete with lava lamp, massage chair and wonderful views of the water — where Google employees can presumably dream up the next great Internet application while their muscles are relaxed.
Visit -
Google Zeitgeist 2007
Google’s always-entertaining year-end Zeitgeist has been released.
Visit -
Google Announces the OpenSocial API
You sort of knew this would happen with Brad Fitzpatrick joined Google, but I certainly didn’t expect it to be this soon. Awesome — can’t wait to see where this goes.
Visit -
Jaiku using Python, Django
Jaiku, which was just bought by Google, is using Django. Google has already used Django in a few projects — exciting to see it get adopted by such a huge player.
Visit -
Google still growing on Eastside; 3 buildings leased in Kirkland
Good to know, in the event that Keith fires me for kicking his as in fantasy football.
Visit -
Official Google Maps API Blog: Microformats in Google Maps
I say: “Cool, now tell me how this benefits my Mom.” In other words, I say the same thing I’ve been saying about Microformats for a year now: they’re cool, but until someone builds some consumers of Microformats, they’re basically just geek masturbation. Please, someone do something useful with Microformats that affects people who respond to the words “Firefox” and “extension” with a blank stare.
Visit -
Life at Google - The Microsoftie Perspective
Interesting look at what it’s like working for Google, from someone who (apparently) now works at Microsoft and is trying to help them be more competitive with Google in recruiting.
Visit -
Google Maps: Street View
Holy shit. Google wins. This is freaking awesome.
Visit -
Google pays $100 million for Feedburner
The real implications of this probably have to do with advertising in feeds, but I’m personally more interested in the fact that this probably means I’ll be able to track my feed stats in Analytics. Sweet.
Visit -
Veen: The New Google Analytics
The new Analytics looks really great. So glad to see the work of the former Measure Map team seeing the light of day. Sadly, you can’t have it yet. The Analytics page hypes the redesign with screenshots, and then when you log in, it infoms you that you’ll get it “over the coming few weeks.” Annoying.
Visit -
How to beat Google, part 1
Rich Skrenta has some great ideas here. I only disagree with number five, which says, “forget interface innovation.” I disagree in large part because I agree with number six, seven, eight, and nine — which are all about interface innovation. But aside from that little inconsistency, these are great tips on not just how to beat Google in the search area, but how to approach your competition (i.e. how you should be similar and how you should be different) for any web product.
Visit -
News Corp. and NBC to take on YouTube
This is about as likely to unseat YouTube as the Zune is to unseat the iPod. That is to say, not chance in hell.
By and large, traditional media companies are losing to tech companies and web startups. Why? Basically, because they’re followers. Very few of them have the foresight to snatch up the brilliant young minds in the web world, and instead just follow the leader (in this case, YouTube). But the Internet seems to favor innovative and first-to-market products. Traditional media hasn’t released many of either.
(All that having been said, there are a few traditional media companies who get it…thank God.)
Visit -
Money: How Apple Kept its iPhone Secrets
A short, but interesting, piece on the lengths Apple went to to keep the iPhone’s details on the DL, even while working with Cingular, Google, and Yahoo.
Visit -
Dashalytics: A Google Analytics Widget
Very nice-looking Dashboard widget for viewing your website’s stats very quickly. Look great. If I were using Analytics, you can bet I’d be using this.
Visit -
Google: 2006 Year End Zeitgeist
I always enjoy looking at these.
Visit -
David Seah: Mint versus Google Analytics
Well-crafted comparative review. Personally, I’m still on the Mint bandwagon, mostly because I feel like it gives me the timely information I need at a glance. Google Analytics is very good, though, especially for the low, low cost of free.
Visit
Jeff Croft
I’m a digital product designer and developer in Seattle, WA. I currently work with nGen Works, and recently co-founded Lendle, a Kindle book sharing service.
Some of my clients include Facebook, Microsoft, Yahoo!, Copious, The New York Review of Books, The Lawrence Journal-World, and the University of Washington.
I’ve authored two books on web and interactive design and spoken at dozens of conferences around the world.
Filter content
FeedItems tagged google
By content type
FeedOther tags in these items
- webdesign 1068 (100%)
- design 857 (80%)
- conference 567 (53%)
- webprogramming 531 (50%)
- apple 444 (42%)
- django 437 (41%)
- humor 405 (38%)
- worldonline 337 (32%)
- python 321 (30%)
- css 309 (29%)
- mac 300 (28%)
- dkeithrobinson 289 (27%)
- event 282 (26%)
- technology 278 (26%)
- sanfrancisco 269 (25%)
- business 225 (21%)
- journalism 203 (19%)
- video 197 (18%)
- osx 196 (18%)
- software 183 (17%)
- iphone 180 (17%)
- webstandards 175 (16%)
- mobile 143 (13%)
- javascript 127 (12%)
- tv 107 (10%)